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PVV – what’s in a name?

Some of you savvy sorts may have noticed subtle changes to the PVV world as of this morning – exposition regarding why and what is below.

However before you get to that, I must thank my friend EC for facilitating this stage in PVV’s growth – you’re a super badass, brother. Profound thanks.

FYI: this exact same text is also posted under a new little tab (with the same name) above. Enjoy!!

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When I began PVV in June of 2010 (on blogspot!!), I really struggled with the name.

As a sociologist, feminist, social justice advocate, and human being, I firmly believe that the US adult production industry is worth serious scholarly consideration. It’s culturally significant and extremely influential. One does not have to like porn or support the industry, but it is limiting (and foolish) to attempt to ignore or dismiss it.

As a consequence, I didn’t want some esoteric flowery name that pretended to be something it wasn’t. Historically, the vast majority of legal adult content production in the US has occurred in and around Southern California’s San Fernando Valley, or “Porn Valley” as it’s sometimes colloquially referred… and one objective of my work is to engage and evaluate adult industry-related happenings from a critical, interdisciplinary, and “real world” vantage point – thus, Porn Valley Vantage!!

It seemed simple enough to me, but man-oh-man was it anything but.

You see, in my mission to refrain from mincing around the issue of adult industry marginalization, I figured having “porn” in the name was a good thing. Fight the power!! Engage problematic issues head on!! Blah, blah, blah…

But just like the “fighting” in UFC and the “fried” in Colonel Sanders (KFC), I didn’t fully realize how quickly “porn” would cause some people to shut down and/or turn off. It really didn’t matter how much sense I was making or how much new information I was presenting if people refused to even engage the content.

For example, I had an epically disappointing experience with a supposedly progressive women’s blog network because of “porn” (read that story here); and on February 1, 2011, a major social networking site disabled my blog’s page for supposedly violating its terms of service (read about that here). Ick, ack!!

And even people who wanted to read my work were occasionally impeded because of “porn.” lbq, who works for a large Southern California-area HMO, found that PornValleyVantage.com was blocked in her workplace; and RB, who often sent amazing thoughtful private comments, couldn’t follow the site publicly because of possible implications in his personal life.

These instances clearly pointed to a need for the work I was doing, but if people couldn’t even access or engage the information… then what?

By this point, people (myself included) had begun referring to the site as “PVV,” so I figured “What the heck?” We live in a world of the acronym, and if it meant that people at Location XXX could read my scholarly, rigorous, funny, sassy, informative, boundary-pushing, complex, and totally safe for work blog on their lunch breaks… well, so be it.